1914: Judge rules martial law legal

The authority of the state to impose martial law in the southern coal strike district was upheld by a judge during the week of Feb. 2, 1914, according to The Pueblo Chieftain.

Upon the ruling by Trinidad Judge A.W. McHendrie, four suspects were remanded to the state militia. Two others were released to civil authorities.

Earlier in the week, it was announced that congressional investigators would travel on Feb. 9 to both Trinidad and Michigan, where another lengthy, violent strike was occurring.

More than 1,000 strikers and their families peacefully marched in Trinidad on Monday.

The militia commander, Adj. Gen. John Chase, told mining companies that his men would not help in evicting striking miners from company towns.

That Sunday , for the first time since late September, there was no news of the labor action on the front page of the paper, a span of more than four months. In fact, there was no strike news in that day’s paper.

Puebloans were worried about Canadians that week. Leaders from Calgary, Alberta, sent agents to the Arkansas Valley to recruit farmers to move north and take up the soil there. “A train is scheduled to leave Pueblo March 1 packed with farmers,” a story said. “The agents are smooth and can do the Arkansas Valley bad.”

In a front-page story on Friday, The Chieftain wrote of the Commerce Club’s efforts to staunch the flow of farmers to Canada. Why would citizens go to Calgary, the paper asked, where “snow balls form the principal diet.”

Speaking of farmers, Vineland was a war zone, according to the paper. A mysterious death, bootleg whiskey sales and the arson of a grocery had residents on edge. Not to mention a couple instances of firing upon random automobiles passing through the area.

Floyd Reed had been killed by a shot in the back while crossing the St. Charles bridge. County commissioners put up a $500 reward for the capture of his assailant. The Muscatto grocery, whose owner, Carmine Muscatto, was doing time for attempted murder, was torched after threats were made against his wife Mary.

The district attorney, Charles Hughes, said he thought Vineland people could handle the problems themselves.

It was cold after a mild January. The average temperature for that month was 9.1 degrees higher than average, which was 29.9 degrees (at that time records were about 25 years in existence). Every day in January had at least some sunshine, a story said.

But when the month turned, so did the weather. During the week, a temperature of 11 degrees below zero was recorded, and locals rarely saw the north side of the cipher that week. But there was just about an inch of snow.

There was a raft of fires on Tuesday night, two at once, and two later. Firefighters scrambled to put out a blaze at Palace Shoe and Clothing Store, 304 Union Ave. The place had already burned down three weeks previous. At the same time, the defunct Trilby Club, an old, unoccupied, two-story brick at the corner of Summit and First, burned. Two smaller fires were quickly extinguished and a false alarm also was recorded that night.

Thirteen-year-old Prax Cedis Triejello was granted a marriage license to wed 22-year-old Frank Mirelles. Prax’s mom OK’d the union and County Clerk Highberger said the granting of a license to one so young was not that unusual, “especially among the Mexicans and Italians. Those girls, especially the ones reared in their native lands, mature much more rapidly than those of the American race.”

The foundation for the new St. Leander School, “on the northeast corner of the Benedictine college,” was being laid that week.

A diminishing meat supply was provoking food for thought. There were 18,259 fewer animals ready for slaughter than in 1910, the paper said, and prices had risen about 62 percent since then. Encroachment of farmland on grazing sites, lack of proper leasing laws and the loss of forage crops as a result of the severe drought in Kansas, Oklahoma and Nebraska were a few reasons cited for the animal problems.

In basketball news , Central beat Alamosa 41-24 in Pueblo on Friday. “It was one of the greatest games the city has ever seen,” wrote reporter Donald Montgomery. In Chieftain stories of 100 years ago, many games, court cases, police actions or club meetings were described as “the greatest,” “most impressive” or “most important.”